S2E12: Long Beach v. Hawaii, USC Injuries, Volleyball Tariffs

Arielle, Chad, and Matt dive into a lively discussion of recent collegiate men's volleyball action and debate the future of the game.

• Hawaii splits with Long Beach State
• USC battles significant injuries to key players, creating strategic challenges for upcoming matches
• Conference tournament predictions across MIVA, EIVA, Big West, and MPSF
• Data reveals NCAA men's volleyball is 16% international athletes
• Discussion of whether international roster limits would benefit American player development
• Proposal for rule changes to improve men's volleyball as a television product, including a service "foul out" rule
• Brief recap of LOVB Championship results, with Austin defeating Omaha in a sweep

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Transcript

Intro & Weekend Volleyball Recap

Matt Houlihan 0:00

My in is mustaches.

Arielle Houlihan 0:02

Ew. Okay, I was going to say ew. I was going to say ew to literally anything that came out of his hair.

Matt Houlihan 0:09

Was that eye contact a little?

Arielle Houlihan 0:10

too intense for you. I'm uncomfortable Literally anything that he said there.

Matt Houlihan 0:15

Hold my eye contact.

Chad Gordon 0:31

There's going to be a blue dot on this house in like an hour.

Arielle Houlihan 0:33

I don't like that okay, try again. Take, lead us in nope welcome back to this week's episode of the coaches group chat. I'm ariel, along with my co-hosts chad and matt. Our producer, bobby, is here welcome back, bobby, our budget our budget was raised this week.

Matt Houlihan 1:00

Our budget was raised this week. Our budget was raised this week.

Arielle Houlihan 1:03

This week's episode is sponsored by the dentist's office and the veterinarian's office, and You're just naming all the places that we spent way too much money at this weekend. We've got a great docket for all of you today. Thank you to all of our loyal listeners.

Matt Houlihan 1:20

Anybody who's why do you sound like you're speaking over the store microphone, like you're like a? You sound like you're speaking over the the store microphone, where you're like very calm and quiet like nice.

Arielle Houlihan 1:30

I've always wanted to do that staff representative. Please report to the poultry section yeah, I've always wanted to do that well, that's good for you.

Matt Houlihan 1:40

I'm gonna bring a little bit more energy to this couch right now, because we had a great weekend of volleyball. I tried to stay up late to watch all of the UH Long Beach matches. I got to the first two sets and then I conked.

Arielle Houlihan 1:57

I phoned it in first and then I was like can I go to bed? Yeah, you went to bed first. I was laying down on the couch watching like this, and I woke up and missed at least 13 points. Yeah, you went to bed first. And then Matt was up. I was laying down on the couch watching like this.

Matt Houlihan 2:05

Maybe 10 minutes later, and I woke up and missed at least 13 points, I was like, yeah, it's time, it's time to call it. I'll watch tomorrow on Ballmatrix. So I tried, but we did stay up and we watched USC Stanford right before that. That went five. We had a nice weekend of volleyball, and so I think that's. I hear we talk about volleyball sometimes that's where we'll start.

Chad Gordon 2:23

I feel like we need to start there.

Matt Houlihan 2:24

So, Chad, give us your perspective, Since you were not asleep on the couch with us. What were your thoughts?

Chad Gordon 2:29

I was not asleep on the couch. Yeah, I would have preferred this couch. This is a great couch. I've watched a lot of good volleyball and I've had a lot of good sleeps on this couch.

Arielle Houlihan 2:39

We're not telling you because the producers of this couch have not paid us enough money to tell you where it's from, but we will if they do.

Matt Houlihan 2:46

This couch is from dropdimesco.

Arielle Houlihan 2:49

Nice, we sell couches. Now Go to the website.

Matt Houlihan 2:51

No, it's actually sold out, but there's other great products you can check out.

Chad Gordon 2:54

They are not from China. Dimes 10 for a 10% off code.

Arielle Houlihan 2:57

We got tariffs on this couch now, so we're going to need a new supplier. We're going to need to just steal this out the window, we'll get back to Terrence later.

Hawaii vs Long Beach Breakdown

Chad Gordon 3:03

Funny, you say that Good segue To Hawaii. Yeah, I mean, I think. What is it? Matt Stradamus over here called the first night win by the beach and then the second night loss, the split on the weekend? Yeah, I mean, Hawaii settled into their own. Obviously, Finn Kearney, coming into the starting lineup, played really really well for them both on the left and the right.

Chad Gordon 3:30

Um, I thought Troy Libero was very impressive against Long Beach's serving. I thought I mean he was just basically digging balls and like that's what you needed to do. Against some of that. He did not get enough credit. I would agree that he was huge, for sure. Yeah, that was some of the best volleyball I've seen him play, I think, this year. Um, and, yeah, it was, hawaii just brought it with their atmosphere and were able to recover pretty quickly and then took advantage of, I don't know, the tire, long beach or I don't know. I know there were rumors about nikolov like not feeling great or whatever, but like credit to hawaii, like sorry, but like they they wanted and why did you say sorry, like I hate hawaii I don't hate, you know so was that directed at you?

Matt Houlihan 4:10

we need to talk to our fans about this. I was looking past?

Chad Gordon 4:13

yeah, were you directing. That was the refrigerator. Why are you so threatened?

Arielle Houlihan 4:16

right now, do you think? Do you think that I'm not defensive like hawaii?

Chad Gordon 4:20

that's like a state do, you do do. Yeah, it's beautiful. It's a great like, great like beaches and yeah.

Arielle Houlihan 4:27

Do you think I like Hawaii?

Matt Houlihan 4:30

What are we talking about? The team.

Arielle Houlihan 4:31

Yeah.

Matt Houlihan 4:32

Do I think you like Hawaii?

Arielle Houlihan 4:34

Yeah.

Matt Houlihan 4:35

Yeah, I think you think they're good. I think you think other teams are better. Yeah, do I think you have a bias against Hawaii? Is that what you're asking?

Chad Gordon 4:41

Yeah, bias against Hawaii. Is that what you're asking? Yeah, that's a real question, really.

Matt Houlihan 4:43

Yeah, 100%. You have a bias.

Chad Gordon 4:44

Really, of course I'm not aware of this bias. Alright, a classic bias bias, would you?

Matt Houlihan 4:51

like us to let you see around the corners of your bias? No.

Arielle Houlihan 4:57

I'm just talking to all the people that are hating on me in the comment section of me putting Hawaii at five. You put them at five I put them lower than everybody else you kept usc, who lost twice this weekend ahead of them was hurt and I think klein is really good and I think that yeah, so was duker, and so was blanchette. Like usc is hurt, yes, 100 way too hurt and I don't think they deserve to go down when they've been playing out of their minds lately yes, healthy usc is top three team hurt my rankings doesn't need

Arielle Houlihan 5:24

to make sense to everybody. They're my rankings for me.

Matt Houlihan 5:30

And that's why we say Exactly. Crazy idea. Are you ready Next time next year for the Traders Poll? We'll remove all the names and we'll just submit them anonymously, so no one will know that's a good idea, because people have been being mean to us. Because people are holding us accountable for our votes.

Arielle Houlihan 5:51

Oh, that's a good idea.

Matt Houlihan 5:52

We should totally do that. We'll edit this part out, obviously.

Arielle Houlihan 5:57

We can't take the criticism from people.

Matt Houlihan 5:59

Exactly.

Arielle Houlihan 5:59

The criticism I've gotten today has been Missy, you can't talk to hawaii like that someone did.

Matt Houlihan 6:07

Someone did comment missy, which I was like who who in this world uses missy ever?

Arielle Houlihan 6:14

anymore been called missy not lately have you ever been called missy?

Matt Houlihan 6:17

what's the male version last?

Arielle Houlihan 6:18

time you were called missy bobby.

Chad Gordon 6:20

It's been a minute hey, hey kid, hey sport, yeah yeah what's the boy versus that sport?

Arielle Houlihan 6:27

yeah, maybe no, somebody calls you sport listen to your buckaroo. It's definitely buckaroo I got words buckaroo yeah, I don't know about that, oh man hey, you gotta you.

Matt Houlihan 6:39

You deserve to get a little bit of smack for that sure it drives the algorithm.

Arielle Houlihan 6:43

Thanks for the algorithm push you can, you can embrace, that embrace that I get the other bit of smack for that.

Matt Houlihan 6:45

Sure, it drives the algorithm. Thanks for the algorithm push.

Arielle Houlihan 6:46

You can embrace that Hold on.

Chad Gordon 6:47

I get the other side of it. They need to win a big match. Win away from your house, away from the stand.

Arielle Houlihan 6:54

Thank you.

Chad Gordon 6:54

They haven't played any big match. I mean, what have?

Arielle Houlihan 6:59

they done CSUN, csun's a big match. They didn't do it.

Chad Gordon 7:02

They split with CSUN and what that's the eighth ranked team.

Arielle Houlihan 7:06

Great Good for you.

Chad Gordon 7:07

That's sick, but you want to be the number two team.

Arielle Houlihan 7:10

Listen, I don't even know. I'm just putting names in order, and Hawaii's is my five.

Matt Houlihan 7:18

You also removed Loyola Chicago completely.

Chad Gordon 7:22

They got rocked by Lewis. They did lose to Lewis.

Arielle Houlihan 7:26

So they lost to Lewis and they were my nine the week before, and so I was like yeah, you're out, you gotta go.

Matt Houlihan 7:30

You gotta go. Stanford's back, stanford's back. Actions have consequences, actions have consequences.

USC Injuries & MPSF Tournament Strategy

Arielle Houlihan 7:34

Exactly. See my rankings only need to make sense to me and make us laugh when we're sitting here. That's it sold there you go.

Matt Houlihan 7:41

Great, then. A victory has been had it's been had the victory has been okay, I'm glad we've settled this all right?

Arielle Houlihan 7:47

well, speaking of usc, there's should I put hawaii's one next week, just just just to be completely unhinged 11, 11.

Chad Gordon 7:54

Yeah, people are gonna troll you even more be saying that.

Arielle Houlihan 7:59

So maybe, yeah, maybe you should, I think uh, I'll put haw, put Hawaii at one if somebody pays me.

Chad Gordon 8:06

Money's. No object Money's the object.

Matt Houlihan 8:09

You want to put your Venmo username in there Did any of us have BYU.

Chad Gordon 8:13

Is BYU still in our thing at all?

Matt Houlihan 8:16

Or is it just?

Chad Gordon 8:16

in the other poll Hunt had BYU. He doesn't pay attention.

Matt Houlihan 8:20

Hunt does pay attention.

Arielle Houlihan 8:21

Hunt pays more attention than.

Matt Houlihan 8:23

Brad does.

Arielle Houlihan 8:30

Brad pays attention to the top three. He doesn't listen to this hunt or this. Oh, I don't know, brad. Brad uh went to the stanford usc game and then just made switches based off stanford was like oh, I like the way stanford played great put them in, yeah, yeah that's it.

Matt Houlihan 8:42

Yeah, no, I, I don't I, I think it was just those two. Did you have you in there?

Chad Gordon 8:48

no, yeah they haven't beaten anybody since ball state like we stanford let's talk about ball state okay, not number five anymore. No, they're not.

Arielle Houlihan 8:58

They started at five okay, so who had them up high? I remember I need to make my myself I had make myself one of those little Mastrodomus videos, because I'm pretty sure that I said there's no way in hell Ball State is going to stay here, you did, you did, yes, can you make me a video like that. I got shit to do.

Matt Houlihan 9:17

I'm yelling into microphones a lot. I got things to do.

Arielle Houlihan 9:20

Could you do something nice for me once? Yes, I'm sorry Acts. Can you do something nice for me once?

Chad Gordon 9:23

Yes, I'm sorry.

Arielle Houlihan 9:25

Acts of service.

Chad Gordon 9:26

Come on.

Arielle Houlihan 9:26

Yeah, I'm going to have an airdrop waiting for me you did yeah, coming up.

Matt Houlihan 9:30

we're going to do our recap to look at our preseason predictions to where we're at now coming up and we're going to go. We're going to get to that place, but first and foremost, can we talk thec? Since we were there before, I'd like to just pull us back real quick so we can finish off the usc conversation. Usc injured yes, healthy. I think everyone would agree top three team. They've been having a hell of a season and now they are ramping up they're limping, they're limping their way in, they're limping.

Matt Houlihan 9:58

You've got duker has been out for two weeks, not sure of the extent of where his injury is at. Klein didn't play against Pepperdine night two. He tried to give it a go against Stanford, played all five sets but was kind of in and out, struggling a little bit. Played on the left, played on the right and then didn't play in night two. Blanchett's been nursing a back injury. He was in and out. So you've got a banged up starting group for them. They, they have UCLA this week, you got Crosstown rival, then you got MPSF tournament. Obviously they have a good record, but they're also at the point now where they might not have that at large locked up, where they might need to win the MPSF tournament. So if you're Nygaard and the USC staff, how are you game theory in this? What are you stepping into? Are you trying to run Klein and the A's? If they're feeling good, let's just assume they're not at 100%. Chad, how would you play this?

Arielle Houlihan 10:51

He doesn't want to hear my opinion.

Matt Houlihan 10:52

No, no, I know you're going to have a spicy take, so we'll get to you. I'll go with the mild.

Chad Gordon 10:56

I'll go with the mild salsa on this one.

Matt Houlihan 10:57

Yeah, salsa fresco over there.

Chad Gordon 10:59

Yeah, I think if it's an ankle or something like that where it's like, all right, I know, if I just get off of it for a few days it'll get me where I need to go and you know, hey, maybe we can get through the first round of MPSF by another day or two.

Arielle Houlihan 11:13

Okay, how long do they have? Two weeks.

Matt Houlihan 11:16

I believe there might be a week in between. They might have three weeks. No, it's two weeks. No, it's two weeks, it's two weeks, yeah, yeah, because then you're right in the middle, two weeks is short.

Chad Gordon 11:27

Yeah, I think it's a pretty fast turnaround. I think they probably have to try and win these UCLA ones, because you put a lot on the line and you don't know if they're going to be healthy in the playoffs. But yeah, I don't know. I don't know exactly what the injuries are, so I don't know who's playing with what. Uh. So I think, if they're small-ish things, I think you push. I think if they're medium to large things, like if it's a knee and not an ankle or something, maybe you you play night one and like see how it goes so you're, you're thinking they need to try and they need to get a win against ucla.

Chad Gordon 11:59

For the at large, I think, oh yeah, to give themselves the best chance, let's say they, they, they're hurt and they drop both to UCLA, which is super possible because UCLA has like 40 guys who are all like blue chip kids. Okay, that's another two L's. Do you get it at large like that? I don't know.

Matt Houlihan 12:18

You don't?

Chad Gordon 12:19

Probably not, then you're going to lose to somebody in the playoffs. I don't know. I think you got to win the conference at that point.

Arielle Houlihan 12:26

I'm going to sleep today. I'm waking up ready for the MPSF, I'm forfeiting both games and I am getting ready to make a run.

Matt Houlihan 12:37

Rest everybody. You're not even going to let Jack Everton have a go at UCLA. No chance.

Arielle Houlihan 12:41

Jack needs to be ready for the MPSF.

Chad Gordon 12:43

He could get hurt getting off the bus. Yeah, we need everybody ready.

Arielle Houlihan 12:46

We need everybody ready to go?

Chad Gordon 12:47

We're not going to even cross the town. We're going to sleep.

Arielle Houlihan 12:50

We're all locking in and we're getting ready to make a run.

Chad Gordon 12:55

Get in the fucking bubble.

Matt Houlihan 12:56

Yeah, it's the bubble. No one's going to come knocking for Ariel as the head coach of their collegiate men's volleyball program.

Arielle Houlihan 13:04

Thank God, I'm with you. You might as well phone it in. I'd rather make double.

Matt Houlihan 13:12

Shit shots fired. I'm with you, chad. I'm thinking you got to try and get one against UCLA.

Chad Gordon 13:22

I think if you split, that's still a good look, sure.

Matt Houlihan 13:25

I get that we have no knowledge of what the injuries are, what the extent is. Obviously you got to prioritize that, but if there is the ability for them to go, it's like a choice of like hey, we can go hard this week if they win both, do they get the at large?

Matt Houlihan 13:39

I'm. I mean, there's no guarantees at all, obviously. But what do you think I think they for if they beat ucla twice? There's no guarantees at all, obviously. What do you think If they beat UCLA twice? There's a very good chance that they're still in that at-large consideration. Obviously, the two losses to Stanford don't help. But if you win, the other thing that that committee looks at is how you trend into the tournament.

Matt Houlihan 13:55

And that's the struggle, that's the sad part for USC right now it's so hard, they've been playing so well and they're just at the wrong time. Kids are getting knocked out.

Arielle Houlihan 14:05

Hey, hopefully, hopefully. These, like these kids, are a little bit banged up but they're able to like, recoup and get ready to go. Yeah, I mean.

Matt Houlihan 14:14

I want to see a full, a full strength, because if you played this match, they're the most interesting team to me. If you played that, that match three weeks ago, when usc is still like in prime form yeah, that's.

Arielle Houlihan 14:26

Ucla is in prime form.

Matt Houlihan 14:28

My goodness that would have been, or it could be.

Arielle Houlihan 14:30

It still could be if they're still going. Yes, but I gotta think pretty great.

Chad Gordon 14:36

That was pretty nonchalant.

Matt Houlihan 14:38

Yeah, he had. He had a couple, a couple of plays in that game that were like damn still very physical, but not anywhere near the you could see him limp in and I mean, it was also a five setter and like long game. He was. He was being taken in and out. He didn't have a kill through the first, like half of the second set, yeah.

Arielle Houlihan 15:00

It's not their normal game.

Chad Gordon 15:03

Hopefully.

Arielle Houlihan 15:04

USC is back, ready to go.

Matt Houlihan 15:06

Hopefully USC doesn't forfeit two games against UCLA and we can watch some good matchup. Play the one at home.

Arielle Houlihan 15:12

Don't get on the bus To anybody that's listening that doesn't realize that I'm kidding. You're an idiot. That's okay, Good for you All right.

Matt Houlihan 15:19

We've been making some predictions as of late. We like to do that sometimes. We're getting close to the conference tournament, speaking of that very coveted automatic birth into the NCAA tournament, so I'd like to take us around the horn again and, ara, you get to kick us off this time.

Arielle Houlihan 15:35

With what, predict what?

Matt Houlihan 15:37

With our conference champions. We're going to start. We'll keep it right here in the MPSF. We'll keep it right here in the MPSF, because we were already talking about them.

Conference Champion Predictions

Arielle Houlihan 15:45

So the EIVA, go ahead. Who you got, I don't care. The MIVA I'm going to go. Mckendry, yeah, coming out of nowhere just like figuring it out.

Chad Gordon 16:00

The long con with the double Ls. They're coming back, yes they're coming back.

Arielle Houlihan 16:07

I got McKendry A Tale as Old as Not A Tale as Old as Time. They've never done it before, wouldn't it be so cool, mckendry?

Matt Houlihan 16:12

Oh yeah, I would love. I would love a McKendry.

Arielle Houlihan 16:15

Okay, big West, I got.

Matt Houlihan 16:22

I West, I got, I got Long Beach. Can we go one at a time?

Arielle Houlihan 16:23

here. Oh, I thought you're Miva. Great, now we've got your McKendry.

Matt Houlihan 16:26

Thank you Chad your turn. Let's debate the conferences at a time.

Chad Gordon 16:30

My heart, needs to be some logic. My heart would love Nikki, my brain says Loyola because of Parker. Sure, that's one of the many name a McKendry player. Don't know, don't know, I don't either, don't know.

Matt Houlihan 16:46

Their outside hitter comments on all of our stuff. Really yeah, he's a great dude, that's so nice, he's all in Nicky's, the only one I know. I'm blanking. No, his name is on the tip of my tongue. I can see his face. He's their captain, oh one, and I'm blanking on his name mckendry, I'm sorry, my guy we'll look it up.

Arielle Houlihan 17:03

We're gonna know everybody's name after this. I'm gonna look it up.

Matt Houlihan 17:05

I'm only here for nikki nikki's team I want nikki number one, nikki number two nikki number three.

Arielle Houlihan 17:11

Nikki number four I want so badly to save all state because that was my that would be so funny early season pick, it would be a longer, I'm sure that's what their gym sounds like right now of like, all we gotta do is get back to number five.

Matt Houlihan 17:29

Yeah, but man, oh man, I've. I've watched a couple of the recent games and it looks like it's, it's, they're just it's not crisp at all yeah. Loyola looks so much more crisp. Even Lewis, like I'm more inclined to pick my dark horse pick would be Lewis Really. Because they, yeah, they just they have games where they look like they can beat anyone. And then they have games where you're like what in the world has happened? Like how hungover is this group of kids?

Matt Houlihan 18:00

High ceiling, low floor, that's okay and so yeah, I mean honestly that's that's where my head goes is like yeah, I think loyola is the safe bet mckendry is is is right there. They can absolutely do it. They've beaten loyal already this year. I think it would be a fairy tale. I think I'm gonna go with lewis because I want.

Arielle Houlihan 18:19

I think they could do it too trying. He's just trying to clip farm right now.

Chad Gordon 18:22

That's the best beard in the Mewiff it's not a clip farm at all, Honestly if I want to be.

Matt Houlihan 18:26

Mastrodomus right now. This is a bad. This is a bad Mastrodomus pick. This is a. This is a high risk, high risk choice. I want McKendry to win, so I'm gonna pick mckendry. I like that. You're picking loyal, you're picking lewis. Should we have a watch party? Maybe, if it happens it happens, we usually do that anyways. All right, let's go to the eiva.

Arielle Houlihan 18:50

We'll start with chad, since I do care about the. I do care about the eiva. I just wish they were all better right now we all picked penn state to win the eIBA. We all agree that that's still who you pick.

Matt Houlihan 19:02

Let's find out.

Chad Gordon 19:03

Chad, you guys are going to start with me, man, it has not been super impressive out there.

Arielle Houlihan 19:10

Easy year out there.

Chad Gordon 19:14

Give me some Princeton and we'll see All right.

Arielle Houlihan 19:19

Why.

Matt Houlihan 19:19

A little Rowan David Alvear yeah give me a little Rowan.

Arielle Houlihan 19:21

Yeah, go Rowan, yay, that's about it though. What about?

Matt Houlihan 19:24

it. I am with you. I am also selecting Princeton. They'd be my current pick. After just seeing how it goes, they're in the lead of the EIVA currently.

Arielle Houlihan 19:34

Screw you guys, I'm going Penn State, peter Criss forever.

Matt Houlihan 19:38

He's not there yet. He doesn't go there, but that's okay.

Arielle Houlihan 19:40

I think Pav's the goat.

Matt Houlihan 19:43

Hey, I mean in all honesty.

Chad Gordon 19:45

Wasn't Pav my backup? No, yeah, he was your. Did I pick Pav? Oh yeah, you picked Pav for your beer Olympics team.

Matt Houlihan 19:49

Yeah, okay, well, he'll be free.

Arielle Houlihan 19:51

Yeah, because she took your starting pick which was yeah, Hold on to my beer. Olympics team, you idiots.

Matt Houlihan 19:59

All right, let's take it to the Big West. Let's take it to the Big West. We all picked Long Beach as our. No, no, we didn't. He picked Irvine, I picked Irvine, I think.

Chad Gordon 20:09

No, you picked Irvine, no I picked Long Beach I picked Long Beach, but I picked Irvine to win the Natty oh.

Matt Houlihan 20:15

Wait, you think.

Chad Gordon 20:17

Long Beach wins the conference. Yeah, I think Irvine wins the net.

Matt Houlihan 20:21

I picked Irvine to win the conference. That's what I did. I picked Long Beach to win the regular season and Irvine to win the tournament is what I picked.

Arielle Houlihan 20:28

I picked Long Beach to win the conference tournament and the national championship.

Chad Gordon 20:35

Yeah, I'll get out of the first two rounds of you know, I'll see.

Matt Houlihan 20:40

Yeah, I'll see, I'll get out of the first two rounds of VNL. I'll see, yeah, I'll see. I'll start Um after seeing the season play out. See what this team is. I think you got to bet on long beach. That's just. You know, even even still knowing that they lost at Hawaii, I think if it's Hawaii, long beach again in the finals at big West, that would be an amazing, amazing thing for men's volleyball and I would choose Long Beach in that matchup again, me too. So, yeah, I'm going to stick with Long Beach as the auto qualifier out of the Big West. Sorry, irvine. I think Irvine still gets in as the at-large. If they can not have a bad next two weeks, they're going to be in there.

Arielle Houlihan 21:18

I'm excited to watch it. You got Long Beach still.

Matt Houlihan 21:23

Yeah, long Beach for you as well. Clean sweep of Long Beach for us. Let's go to the MPSF, where things can be quite interesting. Ariel, start us off. Who takes the tournament? Who takes that auto berth? I'll set the stage for you a little bit. I think the MPSF has actually been a lot more back and forth than probably we would have thought it was going to be this year. Lots of upsets thus far.

Arielle Houlihan 21:49

I don't know, Honestly.

Matt Houlihan 21:52

I know there's there's, there's options.

Arielle Houlihan 21:54

Do you got something?

Chad Gordon 21:57

I do, but we're I wouldn't want to upstage you Please, I think UCLA, because SC is probably not going to be healthy.

Arielle Houlihan 22:07

I'm going to go to Matt. What do you think?

Matt Houlihan 22:11

I am currently checking who is hosting.

Arielle Houlihan 22:14

It's Grand Canyon.

Matt Houlihan 22:15

Is it at Grand Canyon? I don't know. If that's true, it's at Pepperdine, it's at Pepperdine.

Arielle Houlihan 22:20

It's the Grand Canyon of the Malibu, the Grand Canyon of Topanga Classic. Boy Meets World joke for you younger listeners. Wait, why did I think that Is it there next year? Yeah?

Matt Houlihan 22:33

it is coming up as one of them, but okay, so Pepperdine's hosting. I like Pepperdine. I think they've done some good things. I like Pepperdine.

Arielle Houlihan 22:39

I think they've done some good things that gives them a little bit of a bump.

Matt Houlihan 22:42

I think USC is limping into it. I think they're still going to be limping into it, and so that's a tough one. Stanford always finds a way in the MPCF tournament. They always find a way to get hot.

Arielle Houlihan 22:55

I want to say Stanford, because it would be so fun, but it's not about us. We have played poorly.

Matt Houlihan 23:00

Stanford has played poorly. I say we Stanford has played poorly in Firestone for the past numerous amounts of years. It's those low ceilings. And with where they currently stand in the MPSF, they're going to need to probably run a pretty tough gauntlet. They're going to see UCLA early.

Arielle Houlihan 23:18

Great If they're in and make some moves. I guess I'll pick UCLA.

Matt Houlihan 23:23

I'm going to go UCLA. That's my, that's where my heart kind of goes to it too. That's where my gut feeling is.

Arielle Houlihan 23:33

Yeah, I guess I'm going to say UCLA Just on paper.

Matt Houlihan 23:38

You got a spicier take for us.

Arielle Houlihan 23:40

Yeah, on paper, USC probably would have been my.

Matt Houlihan 23:44

I don't really know. I probably would have picked a healthy USC over a healthy UCLA. That's why I was really hoping that we would have picked a healthy usc, yeah, over a healthy ucla.

Arielle Houlihan 23:51

That's why I was really hoping that we would have that matchup I will say that I do think that stanford is a team that can upset better teams yes, they've shown that uh, yeah, back, back against the wall, I think the stanford squad.

Matt Houlihan 24:06

That's not who, if, if I'm, we're just fucking homers.

Arielle Houlihan 24:10

We just like Stanford.

Matt Houlihan 24:11

Can you?

Arielle Houlihan 24:11

blame us, we just love them.

Matt Houlihan 24:14

To be fair, I wouldn't want to face Stanford early on.

Matt Houlihan 24:16

I wouldn't want them to be my quarterfinal matchup because they have shown the ability to slay some giants, and when your back's against the wall, those types of teams usually play to near their capacity and when a team can beat top-level teams at their capacity, that's scary to face right. Stanford has been inconsistent this year, but they have shown the ability to be able to beat the Hawaii's. The USC's compete with majority of teams across the board, minus the matchup with Irvine where they didn't really show us anything. So that's not a team I want to face, but it's hard to pick them to win the whole thing because they've got to get through three tough teams most likely.

Arielle Houlihan 25:00

The easy pick, I guess, is UCLA yes, but I do think that something else could happen. Yes, 100%. That's what I'm going to stand with 100%, which muddies the waters.

Tariffs & International Players Debate

Matt Houlihan 25:08

If UCLA doesn't win the NPSF, they're in a very good position to get an at-large. Still, as long as they don't even I mean even if they split with USC, I think they're still probably in a pretty good position with their record Right, whereas the big West it's like you got to you. You want to get to the finals of that and if it's irvine, long beach or hawaii, then they're probably good for that. But even still the third place team right. If irvine loses in the semis type of a deal, they could still get that at large tariffs what are they welcome to our segment that we like to call tariffs question mark what are they?

Matt Houlihan 25:49

Welcome to our segment that we like to call tariffs question mark.

Arielle Houlihan 25:53

What are they?

Matt Houlihan 25:54

This is where we solve and fix the world's economy from the couch.

Arielle Houlihan 25:59

Tariffs. Are they bad?

Matt Houlihan 26:01

Are they good? Should we impose tariffs on college volleyball? Aka only two foreigners per team.

Arielle Houlihan 26:10

Oh, let's talk about that. For a second Luxury tax. Let's actually talk about it.

Chad Gordon 26:13

You're paying a tax for everybody over the cap.

Arielle Houlihan 26:16

We did some digging.

Matt Houlihan 26:17

Oh yes, on the foreigners From our last pod, from our last podcast, james got to work and he put it all together. So here's the task I gave to James. I said, james, I need you to go to the big four conferences and look up the rosters and put every single player's name, hometown, where they're from, blah, blah position. And then there's a box that says foreign or domestic.

Chad Gordon 26:44

And so we went through gbt gonna scrape that for you maybe he james reliably.

Matt Houlihan 26:48

James is the goat.

Arielle Houlihan 26:50

He did it for sure, just making sure, so I wanted to make sure. If you want something done right, james? You want something done right hell yeah, james, take the rest of the day oh oh my gosh, that's badass if you did that, james. Okay so.

Matt Houlihan 27:13

So we did some digging. We've got the math.

Arielle Houlihan 27:14

We've got the numbers everybody.

Matt Houlihan 27:16

There's 536. 536. Obviously, athletes in the top four programs. The numbers break down to basically every team has. The average is each team has about 3.3 foreigners per roster.

Chad Gordon 27:37

I would have said 3 or 4.

Arielle Houlihan 27:39

Do we think that's too much?

Matt Houlihan 27:41

Yeah, If you look at it from an 18 roster cap which we are currently not in but next week that could change. It would be right about that. You'd be looking at three.

Arielle Houlihan 27:56

I don't think. When we got these numbers, I thought that it was more.

Chad Gordon 28:02

Per team.

Arielle Houlihan 28:02

Per team. I don't think that that is too many.

Chad Gordon 28:09

Do you have a split of what this is for, like teams within the top 10? Great question James filter your list based on their ranking.

Arielle Houlihan 28:21

Ariel's ranking of the top 10.

Matt Houlihan 28:26

No, I don't have that.

Arielle Houlihan 28:26

Okay, but useless.

Chad Gordon 28:29

I'd be, I'd be more like. So there are just a lot of teams, I mean I. There aren't that many, but there are a lot.

Arielle Houlihan 28:34

There's only 536 athletes.

Chad Gordon 28:35

Yeah, we don't talk about most of the teams, right, like it took us a minute to remember like who fairly eva. Yeah, you know so, um, yeah, I'd be. I'd be curious about, like of the top teams that are competing to, you know, being the semis and finals of these conference tournaments okay what percentage of that is, uh, these international guys?

Matt Houlihan 28:56

after we sorry, I have another math it's 83 total international athletes of the five of the 537, which equates to about just over three point something per percentage that Percentage, that's like 16%.

Arielle Houlihan 29:13

Yeah around there 16%, Wow impressive to do that in your head. We've talked about it already. I can't do math that fast. I tried to give you that. No, no, no. I don't want people to think I'm smart.

Matt Houlihan 29:25

We could definitely dig down deeper into that data of like all right, how many of them start? How many of them are starting on these teams? How?

Arielle Houlihan 29:31

many of them are. I changed my mind on this how?

Matt Houlihan 29:33

many of them are playing on top 15 teams, so on and so forth.

Arielle Houlihan 29:37

I don't mind the international kids playing. I uh, I changed my mind halfway through our conversation. Last time we talked about this too, because you've got, uh, we talked about Sonny on.

Arielle Houlihan 29:51

Long Beach as a good example of this of like he's not getting as much time because the Euros are playing, and for me, he's getting the time in practice. So that disproves our theory of like every kid in our gym, the amount of time that they spend playing in practice is where they're going to get better, not just playing on the court during tournaments, and so I truly believe that where the highest level gym that you can be in is where you're going to get better, and I think that kid gets better because he's in the gym with better athletes.

Chad Gordon 30:18

I don't disagree, but I think there's still something like when you're trying to get recruited to the next level, right?

Arielle Houlihan 30:24

The 18 roster cap is what I have a problem with.

Chad Gordon 30:27

Sure.

Arielle Houlihan 30:28

I don't have a problem with the Euros.

Matt Houlihan 30:33

I have a problem with the euros, I have a problem with the 18 roster cap, I think. Keep going with what you were saying, though, because what he was. What he's saying is basically if these guys want to play at the next level, if you want american talent to play at the highest level, they need to be seen.

Matt Houlihan 30:42

So there's about. I think there's a balance. It's not a, it's not a zero one binary code that says hey, no foreigners, or for free range of foreigners yeah, I mean like when karch flies out to like purdue, to watch annie drews play.

Chad Gordon 30:56

Like what about you know? Okay, well, that doesn't happen if there's some euro playing, like you know, above these kids right. Like if spra's coming to the gym like oh, I'm coach, coaches the men's. Now it's braz, the ceo of usa volleyball, so I'm talking a couple years ago.

Arielle Houlihan 31:09

Yeah, I got you.

Chad Gordon 31:14

But when you're looking at these teams, if you are that third kid or something like that, you may not get seen collegiately, you may not be on these lists or whatever, and then you're not playing against the A's of all these other teams too.

Chad Gordon 31:30

You're playing against your A's or splitting in your gym, but if you're the third's right of all these other teams, too right. You're playing against your A's or splitting in your gym, but like if you're the third kid at whatever OH3, you didn't play against Moni Nikolov this year, you know, I guess, unless you're Finn Kearney but, like other than that right, like, yeah, you get to play in practice.

Chad Gordon 31:47

There is a lot of merit to that, for sure, but you're not going against the the best of the best in the nation. Plus then, yeah, if you want to get recruited to go, or like get scouted, I guess, to go play pro overseas, you have a smaller chance to put film together.

Matt Houlihan 32:03

and let's be real, game time in a game matters.

Matt Houlihan 32:07

Yeah, like there's a reason why, when we talk when we're club directors and we talk to our coaches, is there's never gonna be a time where we just sit kids on the bench, yes, for a whole tournament. That would be a bad experience because kids need to play. There's never equal playing time, that's not. That's not a thing specifically when you're trying to win, but there's most definitely a difference between practice time and game time and getting that competition reps. So, yeah, that's where I love how this started, from tariffs as we kind of go back from it, but like it's a funny game for this.

Matt Houlihan 32:38

The idea the idea of a tariff is basically it's an incentive. Right, you're trying to incentivize growth in an american market. Okay, I, I'm not trying to put% tariff on, like no foreigners allowed, like that's not what we need. We want higher level men's volleyball in our country. We want to bring an international talent that's at the top of the level, but we also if if we're going to get capped on the roster spot, that's got to cap the international too. That's that's going to need to be a cap.

Arielle Houlihan 33:07

The serving misses yes.

Game Rule Changes & TV Product Discussion

Matt Houlihan 33:10

That's a whole other can of worms when it comes to how we improve the sport. But I think Chad was one of the ones that said it on the serving side. It's like this is the logical conclusion of where men's volleyball goes. You can't put in a lollipop. We're too good, we're too offensive. If we're in system, we're going to score 85% of the time. So you've got to grip it and rip it. You got to get them off the net, otherwise you're just going to lose the point anyways. So in reality, it's kind of two, two factors you're. In order for us to miss less serves, you need the offense to be less effective, or surpassing needs to be more difficult or you make the foul out rule.

Matt Houlihan 33:49

I think the foul out rule is yes, you can make the incredible I love the foul rule as well and I think it goes hand. But I think you need both things at once. Because if you, if you're trying to make the best tv product which is where we kind of always look at it from the lens of how do we make the sport more broadly, how do we more broadly reach a larger demographic, a, a larger audience it's through television. So you need to get television product. Serve, pass, kill, serve, pass, kill, serve, pass, kill is not a good product either. It's better. It's better than misserve, misserve. But the better product is rallies.

Arielle Houlihan 34:24

Is it men's volleyball or women's volleyball is a better product.

Matt Houlihan 34:28

Right now, I think women's volleyball is a better product Because there's better rallies. Because there's much better rallies, do you agree?

Chad Gordon 34:32

with that. Yeah, there's just more. There's more to watch, I think the physical, the rally goes for 10.

Matt Houlihan 34:40

whatever the highest level of men's volleyball can be great.

Arielle Houlihan 34:43

Yeah, for sure, I guess I agree with you.

Matt Houlihan 34:45

But the product on the whole is better on the women's side because it's a much more watchable television product because of just the length of rallies that you can see every action unfolding. It's a little yes, it's a little bit slower, but even at the highest levels, where they're hitting it just as hard as any collegiate men's volleyball team, they're still getting dicks. They're still getting these rallies.

Chad Gordon 35:08

Yeah, if you're giving me pit Nebraska, whatever Penn state like, yeah, that's, that's big time, that's big time, super athletic, really high level ball for sure. But even like there's a difference between us and our opinion on this, versus like a casual fan who like, oh yeah, like, well, my daughter plays, so like, I like, I like to watch with her. Yeah, they don't, they don't care that, you know. Hey, like if you put a random men's game and a random women's game, maybe the volleyball isn't super impressive, but one of them is going to have a lot of stoppage due to bad serving and a lot of errors.

Arielle Houlihan 35:40

One of them is going to have long routes.

Chad Gordon 35:42

I agree with you, even if it's like, hey, yeah, couldn't score so I tipped it to the libero.

Arielle Houlihan 35:46

At least we're watching something. Yeah, at least something's happening.

Chad Gordon 35:48

I agree with that something, yeah, at least something's happening. I agree that we might think that's bad, but yeah, casual person wants sport.

Matt Houlihan 35:52

That's why I think you, you, you do both things simultaneously, like if you add in the foul rule, then misters become interesting. Okay, you're like. Oh, okay, we got I think it's so.

Chad Gordon 36:01

How many? How many fouls does he have?

Matt Houlihan 36:03

oh like, he's got three fouls like he's got to get this ball in, otherwise the you know next guy comes in and then you also. At the same time, you're not allowed to pass open hand, because now passing float serves becomes way more difficult, and now float serves are way easier to keep in play, and so you can still create that out-of-system situation with not needing to take as big of a risk from the service line. So there's less errors. Or same idea, right? You go full beach mode, just like Chad's preached before you go to open hand tips so it's easier, it's easier to defend and then removes a lot of judgment call.

Matt Houlihan 36:38

So there's good things there. But yeah, I think you need to do both at the same time. When thinking about the men's game in particular as a TV product, I think the women's game is is in a pretty good spot. Could it be better? Sure, would that be beneficial? I think they should test it. They should play around with it.

Arielle Houlihan 36:58

Just interesting switches to the game like that could be a good thing to test for TV.

Matt Houlihan 37:01

Yeah, 100% Great job Tariffs. Tariffs turned into a great segment guys.

Arielle Houlihan 37:07

Tariffs was a really well-branded segment that we didn't realize was going to be.

Matt Houlihan 37:16

Well, we didn't plan any of that job. Bobby worked out nice work. Last segment this is our uh obligatory.

Arielle Houlihan 37:18

Title nine, segment of the of the pod girls, women, women in sports women in stem.

Matt Houlihan 37:23

The love championship took place this past weekend.

Chad Gordon 37:26

I forgot what happened.

Matt Houlihan 37:35

Love Austin won, love wins, love conquers. And who?

Arielle Houlihan 37:38

did they?

Matt Houlihan 37:39

beat, they beat.

Arielle Houlihan 37:41

Love Omaha, it was the rematch.

Matt Houlihan 37:44

It was Texas versus Nebraska all over again, and Texas yet again came out on top.

Arielle Houlihan 37:50

It was cute.

Matt Houlihan 37:52

It was, it was. I think I'd love to see.

Arielle Houlihan 37:55

I mean, I feel like Stacey Sikora's outfits for a second. Does anybody know what I'm talking about here? That girl has got some man. Come on guys, sorry.

Matt Houlihan 38:04

He's killing it.

Arielle Houlihan 38:06

We'll throw some images up there on the on the outfit game as of late, she's assistant for Love Austin. Yeah, and I'm going to say other facts about this that I know about. Julianne Fawcett won. Carly Lloyd won.

Chad Gordon 38:27

I learned they're best friends. Yeah, that's a nice story.

Arielle Houlihan 38:31

A bunch of Texas people won and we're really happy for them.

Chad Gordon 38:39

The top four seeds did not make the finals.

Arielle Houlihan 38:41

They did reverse sweep. They reverse sweep, reverse sweep to win. And apparently those games that day were like insane.

Chad Gordon 38:46

The bottom two teams in the league made the finals and then, yeah, awesome.

Matt Houlihan 38:53

On any given Sunday.

Arielle Houlihan 38:54

Hey, what team did we not talk about today that could win it?

Matt Houlihan 38:59

Ball State we talked about them, for sure.

Arielle Houlihan 39:02

Who else and how they can't win it. Who could win out of nowhere Darkest horse of men's volleyball.

Chad Gordon 39:09

CSUN.

Arielle Houlihan 39:11

No, that's too.

Matt Houlihan 39:13

Queens.

Arielle Houlihan 39:14

No.

Matt Houlihan 39:15

What? Who's the Conference Carolina champion.

Arielle Houlihan 39:17

No, we didn't. We don't know.

Chad Gordon 39:19

Name three teams in that conference.

Arielle Houlihan 39:21

No, we do that, emory. I plead the fifth Barton King Endicott.

Chad Gordon 39:26

Yeah, no Close, but Endicott's D3.

Arielle Houlihan 39:30

Erskine had that kid back in the day that used to pump, fake every single set. It was like this isn't funny anymore. He would go up to try and attack, but he just set the ball every time. You remember that? No, the first year the Conference, carolinas were in.

Matt Houlihan 39:44

Oh yeah.

Arielle Houlihan 39:45

They had the kid that just went up to try and attack. But he just set the ball every time.

Matt Houlihan 39:48

He was Nikolov before Nikolov he just did it, nikolov grew up watching this guy on TV.

Chad Gordon 39:54

He's been watching the Erskine kid. Probably had that poster in his room.

Arielle Houlihan 39:57

I don't know, go Carolina Chad, what's?

Matt Houlihan 40:02

your ins of the day. What's in for you Socks. Fresh pair of socks. Nothing better for Chad than a fresh pair of socks. Chat. Nothing better than for chad than a fresh pair of socks.

Arielle Houlihan 40:11

No, I came with these oh yeah, you got a fresh pair of socks. I got two.

Matt Houlihan 40:15

I got two is a chain oh yeah, look at this guy, pop that chain out.

Chad Gordon 40:21

No, no, just let it pop that chain out, it's a nonchalant chain yeah, it's very casual nice, nice my in is silver chains I've switched all my earrings.

Arielle Houlihan 40:31

We don't do gold anymore, I go silver and that's it for now. I still have some gold in my necklace, but that's okay.

Matt Houlihan 40:38

My in is mustaches.

Arielle Houlihan 40:39

Ew. Okay, I was going to say ew. I was going to say ew to literally anything that came out of his hair.

Matt Houlihan 40:46

Was that eye contact a little?

Arielle Houlihan 40:48

too intense for you, literally anything that he said hold my eye contact there's gonna be a blue dot on this house in like an

Matt Houlihan 40:57

hour that's a tough joke okay.

Arielle Houlihan 41:02

Well, thanks for listening to the coaches group chat. We love you all. Thanks for joining uh. Swipe up, swipe down, like and subscribe most sashes are out.

Chad Gordon 41:11

They've had their time.